Jac's roundup of pop culture news and Internet findings

The
Onion spoofs your news. Now, the folks behind the satire site (and frequent
IJCGE reference A.V. Club) are spoofing most people’s actual go-to source for
world happenings — BuzzFeed. ClickHole
has the whole BuzzFeed game down, from its font and design to its content: Click-bait headlines? Check. Obscurely themed lists and photos?Check. Quizzes to annoy the last shred of
living hell out of your Facebook friends? Yup! Will ClickHole keep up the gig
and continue to satirize the Internet for the foreseeable future or is this just
a limited launch sponsored by Jack Link's? One thing is for sure: Get ready
for plenty of confused old people and dumb teens posting the site
without any knowledge of the joke. Just check the cringe-worthy oblivious comments on its Facebook page!

That
being said, BuzzFeed probably isn’t going anywhere any time soon, either. Who
else is going to point out to me this hilarious goof from the music video for
my teen romance anthem, “Dilemma” by Nelly and Kelly (Rowland)?

OK Go is known for their creative music videos. They also must hold Gob
Bluth close to their hearts, because their latest offering is all about illusions!

Who wouldn’t love receiving a phone call from their favorite musician, movie star or public figure? Celebcalls.com charges a mere four bucks to have a star like Justin
Bieber or NASCAR’s Tony Stewart record either a call or voicemail greeting for a loved one.
Just pick your celebrity speaker, plug in a few details about your friend and a
celebot spits out a greeting that I’m pretty sure is just real sound bites cut
and pasted back together like a ransom letter for your cousin’s birthday. So thoughtful!

Biebz tweeted about the service, suggesting it as a Father’s Day gift. I don’t
hate my dad, but if you do, other celebs include Dr. Phil McGraw, Mike Tyson,
Snoop Dog and 16-year-old YA author and least interesting of the Kardashian
Klan, Kylie Jenner, who’s next gig is an in-store appearance at a Pac Sun.

There’s an NWA biopic in the works, and the roles of Dr. Dre, Eazy E and
Ice Cube have been cast.Straight Outta Compton will star
theater actor Marcus Callender as Dre, newcomer Jason Mitchell as E, and O’Shea
Jackson Jr. — Ice Cube’s son — playing his dad Cube.

R.I.P. IkeaHackers. The creator
of the how-to blog that features alternate uses for Ikea furniture has received
a cease and desist letter from the Swedish furnishing giants. By June 23, the
site must devoid of all advertising space (which creator “Jules Yap” started
selling when the popular site became a full-time job) or the site must relocate
sans Ikea branding. It’s a pretty shitty move on Ikea’s part, considering the
site is essentially a love letter to the mega-store and its hackable, mashable
DIY products that probably inspired many to voyage to their local Ikea warehouse,
drop some bucks and create some hacks of their own. Notable IkeaHacks include
the EXPEDIT bar
and the KNUFF transformable coffee table.

I’ll admit I’m a sucker for
poppy music video recreations starring unlikely dudes, filmed in their
basements.
But the following vid is great in its own right because this scantily clad
heavy-set gentleman werks better in his
natural habitat than Britney does in an professional music video with an actual
budget.

Brit is an icon, but I’d
much rather pay to see this guy perform at Planet Hollywood Las Vegas.

The English language
continues its decent into a hodgepodge of text message shorthand and cartoon
images as Emoji releases 250 new symbols to the Emojipedia this July. Peep the
whole list here (unfortunately you will have
to settle for reading descriptions as the actual Emoji images aren’t available
yet); highlights include a middle finger, a chipmunk, the Vulcan salute, a
weightlifter and so so many office supplies.

The Game of Thrones finale
simultaneously gave me life and sucked my soul away, so I’m feeling pretty
fragile and won’t recap it. There are enough spoilers lurking across the
Internet (including a major bomb about a particular character yet to be introduced…seriously, nothing
is safe) — beware!

Jac's roundup of pop culture news and Internet findings

FX biker drama Sons of Anarchy will embark in its final
ride this fall, after a game-changing penultimate season. The show has featured a few guest stars from the music world, including Henry Rollins and Dave
Navarro. Next on that list is a surprising name — Marilyn Manson.

Manson will play a
recurring role in the final season: Ron Tully, a white supremacist behind bars
who could prove to be a useful player for Jax. Hello, nightmares!

It turns out Manson is far
from the heartless characters he portrays on stage or screen — he reportedly
picked up the role as a tribute to his dad, who is a big fan of the show.

“Sons has been such a big part of my life, as well as my father’s,”
he told Variety. “So I was determined
to make him proud by being involved in what will probably be remembered as the
most amazing piece of television cinema. After all, the very heart of SOA is
about that relationship.” Aww, Marilyn!

Marilyn Manson is not, for
the record, Paul from The Wonder Years.
We now know this as fact because the cast of the family classic recently reunited to promote a Wonder Years DVD set coming soon. We
all know Winnie (Danica McKellar) went on to become a super hot mega genius and
Kevin (Fred Savage) is still involved with show business (he's been a director and producer on Always Sunny and lots of other comedies), but what ever happened
to Paul?

As you can see, grown-up Paul
(Josh Saviano) looks nothing like Manson today. But I guess we never have seen them in the same place at the
same time…

While we’re taking a walk
down memory lane, O-Town is the latest early-‘00s boy band to reunite, though at least 15 women will be upset to discover Ashley Parker Angel, “The Cute
One,” is no longer a part of the band. If you recall, the band was formed as
part of 2000's Making the Band, a show
that acknowledged the inauthentic, assembly-line nature of manufacturing boy bands while also...manufacturing a boy band. O-Town was assembled by Lou
Pearlman, the manager behind the Backstreet Boys, *NSync, LFO, Aaron Carter and
otherPop acts of the 1990s and early
2000s.

Fun Fact: Pearlman was sued by every band/performer he worked with
except one, and is now serving a 25-year sentence for charges of conspiracy,
money laundering and making false statements during a bankruptcy proceeding.
Great job!

Tennis star Serena Williams
“crashed” a wedding last week, because I guess being asked to take a photo with
a bride and groom constitutes wedding crashing.

It would be a fun memory to run into a celeb on your big day, but I don’t know
if I’d really want my new spouse to get an eyeful of this
right after committing eternally to me. Oh well, you know what they say: If you
choose to get married on a public beach, you just might get crashed by a bangin' pro tennis player in animal print. (Also: Are leotards the new
swimsuits?)

The Bottle Boys are a
Danish performance group that use bottles in various ways to play songs. Their
latest cover, of Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean,” is going viral. Check it out.

The crew has competed on Britain’s Got Talentusing beer bottles, water jugs and other containers to recreate popular
songs.

Two badass babes
have signed on to the upcoming Star Wars
Episode VII. Lupita N’yongo — Academy Award-winning actress from 12 Years a Slave and People’s “Most Beautiful” person of the
year — and Gwendoline Christie — better known as Brienne of Tarth from Game of Thrones — are both slated to
star in the latest Star Wars chapter,
along with 600 other amazing actors.

Also in movie news: From
Edward to Indy? Robert Pattinson will likely take the role of Indiana Jokes for the next
reboot.

Now, here’s Chance
The Rapper performing the theme song to my favorite educational cartoon, Arthur, at Sasquatch! Music Festival:

Jac's roundup of pop culture news and Internet findings

With Jenny Slate’s new,
ahem, “abortion comedy” Obvious Childcoming to theaters (no word on a Cincy screening yet), I could highlight
many examples of the comedian’s genius: Marcel
the Shell with Shoes On;
Mona Lisa from Parks and Rec;
“PubLIZity” on Kroll Show;
even the f-bomb heard ‘round the world on her SNL debut.
But I truly cannot get enough of Catherine,
one of the strangest and most hilarious little web series I’ve ever watched!
Take about 30 minutes and watch this gem from beginning to end. Then lather, rinse,
repeat.

Nearly 20 years after Tupac
Shakur’s death, a police officer present at the scene that night has come
forward to reveal the rapper’s last words: “Fuck you.”
OK then.

Conan O’Brien is a true
talent, and I love the guy but I’ve hardly tuned in to his show since his move
to TBS (kind of like how I “support” local restaurants but still just eat Taco
Bell anyway sometimes). But I did tune in recently to catch what is apparently
a recurring bit: Clueless Gamer. Conan, not a big video gamer, tests out a new
or classic game, mocking various aspects to comedic results. Last week Conan test-drove
Watch Dogs, which was released across
platforms Tuesday.

Conan and I are about the
same speed when it comes to video games. He can’t help but focus on the
futuristic fashion choices and unrealistic aspects or run over a sidewalk of
people with a stolen UPS truck or, in turn, inevitably perturb avid gamers.

Bill Murray.
Dude seems
to be living the life of a retired playboy, despite the fact that he’s still
very
active in Hollywood. Besides being a pretty much universally loved actor
and
comedian, in his off time he’s campaigning to be inducted in the Cool
Guy Hall
of Fame. In his latest move, Murray addressed a bachelor party at a
Charleston
steakhouse on finding “the one,” and then led the group in lifting the
groom-to-be
into the air. Watch the magic here. Next up: Bill Murray delivers baby in out-of-service
elevator, fashions a diaper out of own T-shirt.

Ever noticed how Red Hot Chili
Peppers drummer Chad Smith bears a striking resemblance to Will Ferrell? According
to Ferrell, the two are confused so often
it’s beginning to become and issue. The doppelgangers met last week to decide
once and for all who was who, and which was the better drummer on TheTonight
Show (aka Where Celebrities Go to Act
a Fool). The results were predictably outstanding:

Fans of True Detective are chomping at the bit for
any clues about next season’s stars and settings. Recent rumors stated Jessica
Chastain was offered a lead, but the Zero
Dark Thirty actress claims that isn’t the case. Thankfully series creator
Nic Pizzolatto revealed a few details
about Season Two: This round — a completely new case, setting and cast — will
feature three leads instead of two (Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson starred
in Season One), it will focus on “hard women, bad men and the secret occult
history of the United States transportation system,” and the action will take
place in a California city — somewhere more off-the-beaten path than L.A. Considering
the bit of pushback regarding the lack of substantial female characters last
season, we can likely expect more focus on at least one woman.

The AMC network bid farewell to two beloved characters recently (spoilers coming). Porkchop — Chihuahua, star of Small Town Security and HBIC of JJK Security — was put to sleep in last week's episode of the reality show. And in "not so real but also pretty sad" news, Mad Men character Bert Cooper passed away in Sunday's mid-season finale. The SC&P co-founder died right after watching the historic Apollo 11 moon landing of 1969 — but don't worry, actor Robert Morse is still going strong. Coop bid farewell to Don Draper — and viewers — in a sweet, surreal and theatrical final scene.

Jac's roundup of pop culture news and Internet findings

And just like
that, “Awards Season” comes to a close. Does anyone else think it went out with
more of a bore than a bang?

Sunday’s Oscars
were preceded by the Film Independent Spirit Awards Saturday. I was introduced
to this indie movie celebration last year and was pleasantly surprised by the
fun, fast-and-loose nature of the show in addition to its highlighting of
lesser-known, smaller-budget films compared to the Academy Awards. Maybe it was
due to Jameson no longer sponsoring the event/getting everyone wasted; perhaps
it was the fact that many of the winners went on to receive Oscars in similar
categories the very next day. Either way, I found this year’s show, hosted by
Patton Oswalt, to be just a little blah.
See for yourself here.

Sunday night was
not much of a departure from that feeling. I do love me some Ellen — she can
always deliver consistently funny material everyone can relate to. She picked
on stars without being too mean and rocked some fab suits, but it takes more
than that to keep me awake through a 15-hour production like the Oscars.

But there were
plenty of both touching and funny moments throughout the night. Supporting
actor and actress winners, Jared Leto and Lupita Nyong’o, delivered thoughtful,
emotional acceptance speeches (while looking freaking gorge). Leto — who I
still can’t believe was the oldest nominee in that category — spoke
about his mother’s inspiring
perseverance, the conflicts in Venezuela and Ukraine and the victims of AIDS as
well as discrimination (both central themes of Dallas Buyers Club). He also looked sharp in a cream tux with
burgundy tie and the most coveted ombré locks of any human man.

And, clearly,
the 42-year-old gets his looks from his hot ass mother. But seriously, maybe we
should consider the fact that Jordan Catalano is a vampire. Any thoughts, Pharrell?

Speaking of, Pharrell performed his Oscar-nominated hit, "Happy," in what appeared to be a legit GAP ad circa 2003.

Lupita Nyong’o,
who won for her role in 12 Years a Slave,
also gave a heartfelt acceptance speech.
Everyone is crushing on Lupita right
now, myself included, but let’s talk about her equally attractive brother,
Peter.